1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a portable terminal. More particularly, the present invention relates to a portable terminal with a hinge apparatus in which the hinge apparatus pivotally couples a pair of housings to each other and provides two hinge axes that are different from each other, whereby the hinge apparatus can provide unfolded states having different appearances according to operation modes.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, portable terminals may be classified as a bar-type terminal, a flip-type terminal and a folder-type terminal according to the appearance of the terminal.
The bar-type terminal has a single body housing on which data input/output units and transmitter/receiver units are arranged. With such an arrangement, the data input unit of this terminal, such as its keypad, is always exposed and is thereby likely to be operated erroneously. In addition, because a sufficient distance between the transmitter unit and receiver unit must be maintained, there is a limitation in how small the bar-type terminal can be made.
The flip-type terminal has a body, a flip and a hinge module coupling the body and the flip to each other. In the flip-type terminal, the body has data input/output units and transmitter/receiver units arranged thereon and the flip covers the keypad used as the data input units, thereby preventing erroneous operation. However, this terminal is also subject to a limitation for compact size because the distance between the transmitter unit and receiver unit must be maintained as well.
The folder-type terminal has a body, a folder, and a hinge module pivotally coupling the body and the folder to each other. The folder-type terminal is opened and closed by rotating the folder, thereby preventing the erroneous operation of the keypad in standby mode in which the folder is folded onto the body. Also, the folder is unfolded in the calling mode so as to provide a sufficient distance between the transmitter unit and receiver unit. Thus, the folder-type terminal has an advantage in its ability to be made compact. For this reason, the folder-type terminal has become very popular among the different types of portable terminals.
Meanwhile, in order to meet various user preferences, sliding-type terminals and swing-type terminals have appeared. In particular, the sliding-type terminals are becoming a more common type than the folder-type terminals.
However, since conventional portable terminals have developed to have an appearance suitable for a communication function such as voice call, text message transmission, etc., they are inconvenient for multimedia services. For example, since the conventional portable terminals have a display device typically set to be longer in the vertical direction, it is inconvenient for the user to watch digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB), motion picture files, etc. with them.